Need a new gaming laptop

Hey there!
I've just qualified for engineering (IIT Kharagpur :razz:

) and need a new lappy for the next four years. My requirements, in order of preference are:

4th Gen Ci7 above 2.2Ghz, turbo boost to minimum 3Ghz (Similar AMD proc would do)
8 gigs of DDR3 RAM
Good GPU, anything above GT850M or HD 7770M would suffice. Memory isn't an issue. 1GB would be sufficient
A battery that should last at least 2 hours on gaming and 4 hours otherwise (VERY IMPORTANT)
A 14 inch screen would do (NOT IMPORTANT), and should be non touch and non reflective (VERY IMPORTANT)
Fast HDD (No 5400rpm for me) above 500 GB
Should have a DVD/BR slot
Enough connectivity options (Well all laptops today have them, so no issue!)

My budget is about Rs. 60000
Please suggest a viable option(s) and thanks in advance!

Congrats and fill the questionnaire...

Siddharthtech said:
Hey there!
I've just qualified for engineering (IIT Kharagpur ) and need a new lappy for the next four years. My requirements, in order of preference are:

4th Gen Ci7 above 2.2Ghz, turbo boost to minimum 3Ghz (Similar AMD proc would do)

8 gigs of DDR3 RAM

Good GPU, anything above GT850M or HD 7770M would suffice. Memory isn't an issue. 1GB would be sufficient

A battery that should last at least 2 hours on gaming and 4 hours otherwise (VERY IMPORTANT)

A 14 inch screen would do (NOT IMPORTANT), and should be non touch and non reflective (VERY IMPORTANT)

Fast HDD (No 5400rpm for me) above 500 GB

Should have a DVD/BR slot

Enough connectivity options (Well all laptops today have them, so no issue!)

My budget is about Rs. 60000
Please suggest a viable option(s) and thanks in advance!

Budget too low for "anything above GT 850m or HD 7770M". BTW HD 7770M is considerably weaker than GT 850M.
Your best bet is Lenovo Z510 with core i7+GT 740M OR Lenovo Y510p with core i5+GT 755M. Lenovo Y510p with core i7+GT755m will be the best laptop for you if you can make it there.
If you want "non reflective" then go with Z510. Y510p has a glossy screen. Alternatively you can get a cheap anti-glare screen cover for Y510p.
Steer clear of Dell Inspiron 15 with core i7 4500U+AMD 8850M. Here the "core i7" is a weak undervolted processor which doesn't even match core i5 processors. It has only 2 real cores as opposed to 4 real cores in core i7s of Z510 and Y510p.

Just wanted to ask you, do they allow laptops in the IIT campus? or do you guys have to keep them in the hostels?

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powerhoney said:
Congrats and fill the questionnaire...

BTW do they allow laptops inside NIT campuses?

seamon said:
Budget too low for "anything above GT 850m or HD 7770M". BTW HD 7770M is considerably weaker than GT 850M.
Your best bet is Lenovo Z510 with core i7+GT 740M OR Lenovo Y510p with core i5+GT 755M. Lenovo Y510p with core i7+GT755m will be the best laptop for you if you can make it there.
If you want "non reflective" then go with Z510. Y510p has a glossy screen. Alternatively you can get a cheap anti-glare screen cover for Y510p.
Steer clear of Dell Inspiron 15 with core i7 4500U+AMD 8850M. Here the "core i7" is a weak undervolted processor which doesn't even match core i5 processors. It has only 2 real cores as opposed to 4 real cores in core i7s of Z510 and Y510p.

Just wanted to ask you, do they allow laptops in the IIT campus? or do you guys have to keep them in the hostels?

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BTW do they allow laptops inside NIT campuses?

i think he got selected for iit .

Technically, they do allow laptops in the campus but it depends on the teacher... Some of them don't even allow cellphones...
Laptops during classes are a rarity though some of the foreigners use tablets to take notes...
As I am in Mechanical, don't feel the need to take a laptop to class... :-D

Btw, how's your SAT preparation coming along??? I am also thinking about going the GRE route after my BTech is completed...

Siddharthtech said:
Hey there!
I've just qualified for engineering (IIT Kharagpur ) and need a new lappy for the next four years. My requirements, in order of preference are:

4th Gen Ci7 above 2.2Ghz, turbo boost to minimum 3Ghz (Similar AMD proc would do)

8 gigs of DDR3 RAM

Good GPU, anything above GT850M or HD 7770M would suffice. Memory isn't an issue. 1GB would be sufficient

A battery that should last at least 2 hours on gaming and 4 hours otherwise (VERY IMPORTANT)

A 14 inch screen would do (NOT IMPORTANT), and should be non touch and non reflective (VERY IMPORTANT)

Fast HDD (No 5400rpm for me) above 500 GB

Should have a DVD/BR slot

Enough connectivity options (Well all laptops today have them, so no issue!)

My budget is about Rs. 60000
Please suggest a viable option(s) and thanks in advance!

increase a little bit in terms of budget.
and there is no match for i7s by amd counterparts. they barely come closer to i5s , let alone be i7.
but i7s are expensive and come with a hefty price tag.
when you bundle a powerful gpu like 750m or better then price will definitely shoot 60k and upwards.
add a couple more of features and you are aimings for 70s.

powerhoney said:
Technically, they do allow laptops in the campus but it depends on the teacher... Some of them don't even allow cellphones...
Laptops during classes are a rarity though some of the foreigners use tablets to take notes...
As I am in Mechanical, don't feel the need to take a laptop to class...
Btw, how's your SAT preparation coming along??? I am also thinking about going the GRE route after my BTech is completed...

@mods sorry for OT.

SAT prep is going along well.
Good luck for GRE!
Do they really have foreigners in NIT? :-?

[MENTION=248727]seamon[/MENTION]
YGPM

@op
Fill the questionnaire and increase your budget...

@op
*www.digit.in/forum/laptops-netbooks/156722-questionnaire-laptop-notebook-purchase.html

Another one of of those thread where a person put on a query without questionnaire.

Sorry guys, for violating the questionnaire rule if there was one! Here I have this filled up.

1) What is your budget? (INR or USD) Rs. 60000-65000

2) What size & weight consideration (if any) would you prefer?

14-15 inches

3) What are the primary tasks will you be performing with this notebook?
Gaming (The new ones), Coding, 3D Modelling, Multimedia (Videos, Music etc.)

5) Any typical configuration in your mind you're eying for ?

4th Gen Ci7 above 2.2Ghz, turbo boost to minimum 3Ghz (Similar AMD proc would do)
8 gigs of DDR3 RAM
Good GPU, should be able to run games like Watch Dogs and Battlefield 4 at respectable framerates at 768p (I Back OFF!!)
Fast HDD (No 5400rpm for me) above 500 GB

4) Are there any brands that you prefer or any you really don't like?
a. Like: HP, Lenovo, Dell, ASUS
b. Dislike: Toshiba, Samsung

6) Anything else you would like to say?

Screen resolution: Anything above 768p

Non Reflective Screen please!!!

Battery back up: Around 4 hours

Purchase place: Anywhere (online, off the street, showroom...)

And yes..I just got through IIT. Don't know anything about the place!
I had thoughts about Lenovo Y510p but there are speculations all over the internet for a disappointing battery life & glossy screen. The Z510's graphic card deters me (Would GT740 be able to handle those?)

GT 740m is undoubtedly weak.
Go for Y510p, the battery should easily last 4 hours. Get a matte screen guard to put on the glossy screen if you can't bear it.
Also if you want more juice then consider something like this:
Amazon.com: Turcom Ultra Capacity Portable External Battery Pack for Laptops and Notebooks (TS-281): Computers & Accessories

Get y510p i5 version.

seamon said:
GT 740m is undoubtedly weak.
Go for Y510p, the battery should easily last 4 hours. Get a matte screen guard to put on the glossy screen if you can't bear it.
Also if you want more juice then consider something like this:
Amazon.com: Turcom Ultra Capacity Portable External Battery Pack for Laptops and Notebooks (TS-281): Computers & Accessories

I wonder why they stopped producing matte screen in y510p. Mine is a fab display.

I would highly recommend Quad-Core processors if you are planning to play futuristic games. Modern games demand a lot of processing , and are optimized for multiple cores. So the more cores you have the better it will be.
For instance , Crysis 3 , Battle Field , etc.

Hrishi said:
I would highly recommend Quad-Core processors if you are planning to play futuristic games. Modern games demand a lot of processing , and are optimized for multiple cores. So the more cores you have the better it will be.
For instance , Crysis 3 , Battle Field , etc.

No point in having CPU power if the GPU can't keep up. It will result in a classic GPU bottleneck as in the case of GT 740m.

From my personal experience I7+GT650m or better should suffice. I have benchmarked loads of performance last year from various laptops .
I can tell that for sure that if you use 650m or 750m or better it will not cause bottleneck. But for 1080p screensize , yiu will have to go with gddr5 edition.

In that case, would Nvidia optimus be suppoted? I won't need my SLI GPUs while coding, would I? So is Optimus supported in SLI configuration? And if yes, would it add to my battery life during non-gaming? (I'd be plugged into power while gaming for sure!)
And yes, I have already made a mind about not choosing GT740M, definitely a bottleneck as you guys have mentioned!

Siddharthtech said:
In that case, would Nvidia optimus be suppoted? I won't need my SLI GPUs while coding, would I? So is Optimus supported in SLI configuration? And if yes, would it add to my battery life during non-gaming? (I'd be plugged into power while gaming for sure!)
And yes, I have already made a mind about not choosing GT740M, definitely a bottleneck as you guys have mentioned!

Let's put it this way:
You WON'T get the SLI GPU in India. You will have a single GT 755m and be happy with it because this is INDIA. According to Lenovo people, Indians don't NEED the power of GT 755m SLI.
Yes, the laptop will support Optimus. I don't think you have much experience with IBM laptops, gaming on battery will result in FPS drops. You will HAVE to game on battery.
Hope this helps. :))

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Hrishi said:
From my personal experience I7+GT650m or better should suffice. I have benchmarked loads of performance last year from various laptops .
I can tell that for sure that if you use 650m or 750m or better it will not cause bottleneck. But for 1080p screensize , yiu will have to go with gddr5 edition.

GT 650ms are almost extinct now. core i7 quad is just too powerful. I haven't seen a game which utilizes my core i7 3632QM more than 60% with Watch_Dogs leading the pack with 60%. However, games like Crysis 3 benefit from it due to the extra threads. I haven't been able to bottleneck core i7 quad with GT 650M SLI OC(converted to GTX 770m).
Meanwhile, processors like core i7 4500U(just slightly weaker than core i5Ms) easily gets bottlenecked by a AMD card equal to GT 755m(AMD 8850M).
This is no surprise, considering their performance is less than half of a quad core i7.

seamon said:
Let's put it this way:
You WON'T get the SLI GPU in India. You will have a single GT 755m and be happy with it because this is INDIA. According to Lenovo people, Indians don't NEED the power of GT 755m SLI.
Yes, the laptop will support Optimus. I don't think you have much experience with IBM laptops, gaming on battery will result in FPS drops. You will HAVE to game on battery.
Hope this helps.

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GT 650ms are almost extinct now. core i7 quad is just too powerful. I haven't seen a game which utilizes my core i7 3632QM more than 60% with Watch_Dogs leading the pack with 60%. However, games like Crysis 3 benefit from it due to the extra threads. I haven't been able to bottleneck core i7 quad with GT 650M SLI OC(converted to GTX 770m).
Meanwhile, processors like core i7 4500U(just slightly weaker than core i5Ms) easily gets bottlenecked by a AMD card equal to GT 755m(AMD 8850M).
This is no surprise, considering their performance is less than half of a quad core i7.

Thanks for clearing the doubt..!
And one more question. I'm good at 3D modelling and I'm sure I'm going to master it a lot in college. Which component would reduce render times most? The CPU or the GPU? and does a better GPU mean that my models would look better after render?
Using Bryce 7 and 3ds MAX 2013

Siddharthtech said:
Thanks for clearing the doubt..!
And one more question. I'm good at 3D modelling and I'm sure I'm going to master it a lot in college. Which component would reduce render times most? The CPU or the GPU? and does a better GPU mean that my models would look better after render?
Using Bryce 7 and 3ds MAX 2013

GPU.
Better GPU means your models will render faster.

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They will look the same.

seamon said:
Let's put it this way:
You WON'T get the SLI GPU in India. You will have a single GT 755m and be happy with it because this is INDIA. According to Lenovo people, Indians don't NEED the power of GT 755m SLI.
Yes, the laptop will support Optimus. I don't think you have much experience with IBM laptops, gaming on battery will result in FPS drops. You will HAVE to game on battery.
Hope this helps.

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GT 650ms are almost extinct now. core i7 quad is just too powerful. I haven't seen a game which utilizes my core i7 3632QM more than 60% with Watch_Dogs leading the pack with 60%. However, games like Crysis 3 benefit from it due to the extra threads. I haven't been able to bottleneck core i7 quad with GT 650M SLI OC(converted to GTX 770m).
Meanwhile, processors like core i7 4500U(just slightly weaker than core i5Ms) easily gets bottlenecked by a AMD card equal to GT 755m(AMD 8850M).
This is no surprise, considering their performance is less than half of a quad core i7.

I don't even consider the ULV anywhere when it comes to mobile gaming. ULV should be strictly avoided when buying a workstation meant for performance.
I have 3610QM , and when I play games like BF3 , Crysis 3 , etc the overall CPU utilization is almost close to 70% at peak , and when I go into multiplayer mode it crosses 85%.
Unfortunately , my GPU is kind of weak as per current market standards. I have to overclock it , to tap some additional benefits.
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Siddharthtech said:
In that case, would Nvidia optimus be suppoted? I won't need my SLI GPUs while coding, would I? So is Optimus supported in SLI configuration? And if yes, would it add to my battery life during non-gaming? (I'd be plugged into power while gaming for sure!)
And yes, I have already made a mind about not choosing GT740M, definitely a bottleneck as you guys have mentioned!

740, is weak GPU. At least as per current standards. Would suggest you to get at least 750m or better in GDDR5 configuration.
But before buying make sure you watch out for headroom for OC. Kepler cards are good at that so try to see if anyone is successfully able to drive that card to good results without hitting that temperature .

Hrishi said:
I don't even consider the ULV anywhere when it comes to mobile gaming. ULV should be strictly avoided when buying a workstation meant for performance.
I have 3610QM , and when I play games like BF3 , Crysis 3 , etc the overall CPU utilization is almost close to 70% at peak , and when I go into multiplayer mode it crosses 85%.
Unfortunately , my GPU is kind of weak as per current market standards. I have to overclock it , to tap some additional benefits.
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740, is weak GPU. At least as per current standards. Would suggest you to get at least 750m or better in GDDR5 configuration.
But before buying make sure you watch out for headroom for OC. Kepler cards are good at that so try to see if anyone is successfully able to drive that card to good results without hitting that temperature .

Something is not right....
I have never seen my CPU go above 60% usage even though I push 30 fps in crysis 3 maxed out and 37 fps in Battlefield 4 maxed out.

seamon said:
Something is not right....
I have never seen my CPU go above 60% usage even though I push 30 fps in crysis 3 maxed out and 37 fps in Battlefield 4 maxed out.

well mine does that from beginning. including my friend's samsung np550pc with almost same config.

+1 to Y510p

V

well i am also in a similar situation , I myself waiting for Y50 , to be launched in august , although it is certainly going to cost more , but has lots of considerable upgrades , that would make it easily last for 4 years , it remains significantly cooler than Y510p , is more slim , has more battery backup , has GTX 860 which has performance greater than 755M SLI with half power consumption and very less heat , with nice overclocking capabilities of maxwell . Its been listed on lenovo india website.
You can wait for MSI too , as classes will begin in july last or august...

Hrishi said:
well mine does that from beginning. including my friend's samsung np550pc with almost same config.

Doesn't the Samsung np550pc throttle like hell??? :-/

R

The major setback of the np550pc is the crappy hard disk which has very high latency when I/O operations are performed. The cpu or gpu aren't throttled but the crappy hard disk makes everything hang and the startup time and application opening times on a 3rd generation i7 are comparable or less than a desktop i3 pc.

I would suggest everyone to stay away from the np550pc series unless you are planning to replace the hard disk on purchase itself or replacing the DVD drive and putting a SSD with caddy. The hard disk ruins the whole experience of the other powerful components.

Ps - I own a np550pc-s03in 3630qm lappy and a few other friends too own the same series i5/i7 version and the experience is pretty much the same for all.

powerhoney said:
Doesn't the Samsung np550pc throttle like hell??? :-/

Well the first batch of this laptop had huge issues , and my friend had it from the first batch itself.
It used to throttle a lot , but then it was later on fixed by Samsung.

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rj27 said:
The major setback of the np550pc is the crappy hard disk which has very high latency when I/O operations are performed. The cpu or gpu aren't throttled but the crappy hard disk makes everything hang and the startup time and application opening times on a 3rd generation i7 are comparable or less than a desktop i3 pc.

I would suggest everyone to stay away from the np550pc series unless you are planning to replace the hard disk on purchase itself or replacing the DVD drive and putting a SSD with caddy. The hard disk ruins the whole experience of the other powerful components.

Ps - I own a np550pc-s03in 3630qm lappy and a few other friends too own the same series i5/i7 version and the experience is pretty much the same for all.

I know your pain.
A Hard drive with poor performance , bundled with windows , can bottleneck the performance of even mighty I7s. I am in a similar situation , planning to switch to SSD.

A 5400 rpm HDD is always waiting to bottleneck the system. Even after paying such a high cost these manufacturers never cared to put in a 7200 rpm HDD or a good ssd.

I agree! 5400rpm drives aren't upto the mark...
Was just watching a comparison vid b/w two laptops, when it came to data transfer, 5400rpm-54mbps, 7200rpm-186mbps!
PHEW!

Siddharthtech said:
I agree! 5400rpm drives aren't upto the mark...
Was just watching a comparison vid b/w two laptops, when it came to data transfer, 5400rpm-54mbps, 7200rpm-186mbps!
PHEW!

Compare to a SSD-500MBps.

S

I just read your first post, regarding GTX850M(the x50 series is no longer officially designated as mainstream dgpus, but gaming ones, hell 850 beats GTX765 with GDDR5 vram), and in case of Lenovo Y50, I just read a review(finally one in English) here
Lenovo IdeaPad Y50p review | Digital Trends Reviews
(Ignore the link, it says Y510 for I don't know what reasons), Now I don't think DT as a good website for reviews, but they are just fine, and when I read about the screen with a contrast ratio of 90:1.....is it even possible ? I mean if it is, it will be a new low for present generation gaming laptops.
Now there is a troubling part in the present laptop lineup by many...many manufacturers in India, you will find laptops with good GPU, but with a weak Processor(see Dell 7000 series, 750 with GDDR5 vram, but coupled with an ULV i5/i7). Honestly, you can't game much on laptops falling in sub 80k range anyways, so you can go with ULV+Decent GPU, will hold for gaming at 720~, and as for rendering and all, you are in IIT, use the resources available there(as I do in my university). I am pretty sure that they will allow you using their server with those mouth watering Quadros and Teslas.

Edit, I would personally recommend you to go through available Thinkpad edge models in your locality(preferably ThinkPad E540) and Dell Latitude E6540, they sould sell anywhere in between 65K to 80K you may go a little bit out of budget and will sacrifice on gaming front, but sure you will get some durable and future proof laptops)